The South American Republics, Part 1 of 2

by Thomas Cleland Dawson

THE REGENCY

After Pedro's expulsion the country was left in a very insecure situation. In Rio the Portuguese were as numerous as the native Brazilians. A great part of the population was under arms and radicalism and revolution were in the air; but, for the moment, fear of the Portuguese and of Pedro's restoration enabled cool-headed, conservative leaders to maintain peace. The members of Congress in the city selected a provisional regency. The ministry, whose dismissal had been the occasion of the outbreak against Pedro, returned to power and, so far as Rio was concerned, government proceeded without interruption. Within a few weeks Congress met in regular session, and a permanent regency was elected. Bahia had revolted and expelled the pro-Portuguese military commander even before Pedro's deposition by Rio. When the news of the events of the 7th of April reached Pernambuco and Pará the troops promptly renounced their commanders.

In Congress grave differences of opinion appeared. The Brazilian party quickly divided into two factions—the conservatives, who were faithful to the dynasty and wanted the fewest possible changes, and the radicals. The former had stepped into control ahead of the latter, but they had not the real force of the country behind them. There was a growing demand for a larger measure of self-government by the provinces and for sweeping democratic reforms.

The regency had no real prestige, the military soon became jealous and dissatisfied, and the party in favour of the Emperor's restoration began to assume a formidably menacing attitude. In July Rio seemed on the point of plunging into a bloody and desperate civil war. The Regency called upon Padre Feijó, the great patriot priest and leader of democratic opinion, and gave him absolute power as minister of justice. His firm measures soon suppressed the disorders in Rio, and the national guard which he organised among the better classes of the people held the revolting regiments in check. In the provinces, however, the local authorities often ignored the commands of the governors appointed by the regency; ambitious local leaders plotted to turn the situation to their personal advantage; and the soldiers and disorderly elements were inflammable material ready to their hands.

In nearly every province civil wars broke out. The typical process was for a military officer, a national-guard colonel, or any other person who had acquired local prestige, to issue a pronunciamento and announce the establishment of a liberal government whose scope was only limited by the imagination and knowledge of constitutional law possessed by the writer of the pronunciamento. If the municipal authorities resisted they were expelled, and creatures of the head of the insurrection put in their places. This overturning of legally existing authority would usually be resented by some neighbouring official or some rival of the petty dictator, and a confused conflict would ensue in which the rank and file of neither side would have a very clear conception of what they were fighting about, although the words of "liberty" and "local rights," "constitutionalism" and "union," were overworked in speeches and proclamations. It is not worth while to give the detailed story of these monotonous and tedious uprisings, massacres, encounters, and usurpations, though the operations often rose to the dignity of campaigns and pitched battles. Hardly a province escaped. In Pernambuco in 1831 the soldiery sacked the city and the people avenged themselves by killing three hundred and banishing the rest. Next year another military revolt broke out in the same city, which soon became an insurrection whose nominal purpose was to restore the Emperor, and which lasted four years. Two hundred persons were killed in Pará in 1831 during a single night of street fighting. A bitter little civil war in Maranhão lasted all through the winter of 1831-32, and was only put down by a general sent from Rio. In Ceará the partisans of the Emperor kept the province in a state of anarchy for several months. In Minas Geraes the friends of Pedro obtained possession of the capital, and the patriots had to fight hard to get the better of them. Though most of these insurrections were suppressed by the people of the state concerned, disrespect for the central government was increasing, and a blind and jealous hatred of the Portuguese and everything foreign grew continuously.

During the four stormy years which succeeded Pedro's expulsion, Congress discussed violently the terms of the constitutional revision which all saw to be inevitable. Though the radical elements predominated, the conservatives and the senate succeeded in bringing about a compromise. A single regent was substituted for the triple system; he was to be elected by universal though indirect suffrage; and, most important of all, each province was given its own assembly with power to levy taxes and conduct most of the affairs of local government. The conservatives managed to preserve the life senate and the nomination of the provincial governors by the central government.

The party in favour of Pedro's restoration had been gaining ground. The Andradas, always in the most extreme opposition when out of power, went over to it, and the conservatives were gravitating in the same direction when Pedro's own death in 1834 put an end to the movement. He died at a happy moment for his fame,—covered with the laurels he had just won by driving out his usurping and absolutist brother, Miguel, and by using that opportunity to endow Portugal with a constitution. By a curious irony of fate, this reckless soldier and descendant of a hundred absolute kings was the instrument through which constitutional government was given to both branches of the Portuguese race.

The statesman who had proved himself most nearly master of the situation during these stormy years was Padre Feijó. He represented the average Brazilian—the disinterested and honest public. He had energy and intrepidity; his eloquence was peculiar and commanding; his advocacy of his beliefs was uncompromising; he had been a leader in sustaining liberal ideas; and he had proven his practical courage and capacity in putting down the counter-revolution in Rio. He naturally became a candidate for sole regent after the passage of the Acto Addicional, or amendment to the constitution. It seemed appropriate that to him should be entrusted the putting into force of the law which was expected to change Brazil into a federation of democracies united under a constitutional monarchy. Elected after a close contest, he took office in the latter part of 1835, sincerely anxious to rule well and sustained by a popular love and confidence such as few Brazilian statesmen have enjoyed. However, from the beginning he was unable to count on the support of a majority of the Chamber. He was not the man to manage by adroit manipulation and skilful distribution of patronage, but his own work and that of Vasconcellos had borne fruit, and the popular branch of the legislature had become the dominating political force in the Brazilian system. The tide was now setting toward conservatism; the heroic impulses that had brought about the revolution of 1831 had lost their force; the nation's temper was cooled; the politicians had forgotten their fine enthusiasm and were busily engaged in personal intrigues.

Feijó inherited from the former regency the two most formidable revolutions which so far had broken out—that of Vinagre and Malcher in Pará, and the great rebellion in Rio Grande do Sul. He was hardly fitted to deal with such a complicated situation as that of Brazil in 1836. He himself said: "I am a man to break, never to bend." Though he gave the officeholders of Brazil an object-lesson in unblemished integrity, his actions were often harsh and arbitrary. When on the floor of the Chamber he had been the chief exponent of democracy, but as chief executive he rode roughshod over his inferiors, refused to be guided by others, even in matters where no principle was involved, and proved that he had the true Latin tendency to centralise administration.

Vasconcellos soon outgeneralled Feijó. A dread of innovation was spreading among the landholding classes. The merchants and Portuguese of the cities naturally gravitated away from the radical regent. The opposition majority in the Chamber, compactly organised by Vasconcellos's skilful management, was encouraged, feeling that it was backed by the mercantile and office-holding classes, and by the persons of highest intelligence and best social position. It clung together with a cohesion unusual in South America, and was the foundation upon which the historical parties were built whose names are constantly encountered in Brazilian political history for the next fifty years.